Building upon the "WHAT IF's to ponder..." by Robert Ricardelli

With our brother Robert Ricardelli's permission, we are going to buiid upon the word he shared entitled "WHAT IF's to ponder as we Elevate in 2008"

1.What if we could really understand and activate true repentance in every area of our lives instead of just feeling sorry for our patterns of sin?

What is true repentance? What did John the Baptist mean when he said, “repent for the kingdom of God is at hand” (Matthew 3:2)? If someone slapped you in the face and, feeling sorry for their action, they ask for your forgiveness but then proceed to slap you again, would you consider their repentance to be sincere?

Several years ago my husband and I volunteered with others to do Bible studies at a youth correctional institute. At one of these sessions I can remember sharing about repenting of our sins before the Lord. One young man (in his mid teens) shared with me that he was going to get a pass to go home and he was planning on seeing his girlfriend. He wanted to know if it was ok for him to be intimate with his girlfriend and later ask God for forgiveness? Even now I smile at his question because it is one born in the flesh, wanting to have our way now and later ask God to forgive us for doing wrong, all the while knowing it was wrong to begin with! Like I told this young man, we cannot knowingly do something wrong and then expect God to forgive us afterwards. When temptation rears its ugly head we need to seek Him to “deliver us from temptation” before we do wrong. Now, God doesn’t expect us to change overnight but He does expect us to take the tools He has given us to turn away from our wrong actions.

Let us take a look at what was spoken by John the Baptist when he said, “Repent for the kingdom of God is at hand.” The word “repent” is the Greek word ‘metanoeo’ and means “to have another mind.” It means to change our thinking on a matter. If someone slaps a person in the face and then repents of that action, that means they are to change their thinking on slapping people in the face! Repentance doesn’t mean continually doing wrong actions and then asking for forgiveness afterwards. It means to recognize that the action was wrong and striving to do it no more.

As a born again believer we are changed from the old man into a new creature. The change doesn’t take place overnight, it is an onward process. A newborn baby isn’t fully matured at birth neither is a new child of God. Time, nutriment, learning and development is required. We are instructed to “put on the mind of Christ” (Philippians 2:5). In other words, we should have “another mind” working within us, exchanging our thoughts and will for His thoughts and will. It is not enough to say we are sorry about a matter, we must change our mind in regards to it, recognizing it as wrong and processing that reality in our minds until it becomes a part of our being that never does it again.

Praise God for the grace that has been given us through Christ Jesus. Changing our thoughts and actions need not be done on our own. Indeed, if we strive to do it on our own we can often fall back into wrongful actions. Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to be our Comforter and Teacher. He is more than willing to let us know when we are thinking wrong and will nudge us to do that which is right in the sight of God. As we allow Him to work within us and are obedient to His leading, change will take place in us. Our walk as a growing Christian means we need to fellowship with the Lord and with our heavenly Father. We need to learn God’s nature and that which is pleasing or not pleasing to Him. Jesus was and is our example and through Him we come to know our Father, Abba and His ways. When we know of His great love for us we don’t want to offend Him and we don’t want to sin anymore. And we come to understand that repenting is not only saying we’re sorry but it also means turning from out wrong actions and doing that which is pleasing to God that we might be a blessing in this world, showing ourselves as mature sons and daughters of heavenly Father. And as we change our minds putting on the mind of Christ, we will find that we have less and less to repent of and more and more to praise Him for. Hallelujah!